Flames of Fury
Chapter 16

Xander

~ 5 months ago ~

“Ro, Varian, if it’s alright with you, Xander had something he needed to talk to you about.”

I alert to the sound of my name, Queen Ianthe looks at me expectantly but I don’t want everyone to know that my mind has been wandering during most of this meeting.

“Ma’am?” I ask, hoping that I don’t look completely guilty for needing her to throw me a bone.

Ianthe pins me with a look that could strip the bark off of trees. Her eyes shift by a fraction towards Accalia and it all begins to make sense.

“Right, yes, thank you for reminding me. Alphas, please. It won’t take but a minute.”

I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this, but it seems things have been spiraling out of control here. The Alphas are slowly going feral, being driven insane by the loss of their mate. Supposedly they’ve killed three pack members in the last week just for mentioning her name. It can’t go on like this.

The Alphas sit down as Accalia, Raine, and Runidar head out. Incandis uses this opportunity to pull me to the side.

“Do you — do you think you could talk to Kat too?” I’ve heard wind blow louder than the voice Incandis uses to ask me this favor. I know it’s hard for him to ask this of me, but he’s my best friend and I will support him no matter what.

I search his eyes for hesitation, or for a change in his mind, because some choices can’t be unmade. His resolution doesn’t waiver though, so with a tight smile and a single nod of my head I agree.

I’m left in the office with the two Alphas. They’re looking at me like I’m personally responsible for Mags’ disappearance, like I could have known she was using me, lying to me.

My Queen, my best friend, lied to me. They don’t get to be the only ones who are angry and hurt.

When will they figure out that we all want the same thing — for Mags to be safe and happy? I’ve been at this a lot longer than them, my friendship with Mags predates theirs by well over a century and twice that long with her brother.

I could absolutely pull rank — but I won’t, because that would upset Mags to see the people she loves and cares about arguing over bullshit. They’re her sparks, that’s a bond I respect. But I’m not going to change who I am and how I treat her just because they’re territorial.

“What could you possibly have to say to us that we’d be even remotely interested in hearing?” Ro spits at me in disgust and anger, but I won’t knock him for it because it is misplaced.

And because what I’m about to say to him will do way more damage to him than anything he could say to me would.

This is sure to backfire in all of our faces, without question. It’s the worst betrayal. Worse than Mags running off, worse than her lying. But if Runidar’s reports are to be believed, the Alphas won’t survive much longer suffering from the separation.

If things continue down this path, there won’t be any mates for Mags to come back to.

It’s this last part of the equation that I cling to, the idea that this is ultimately for the greater good. This is the only way we can protect them. I’m just hoping that Mags and the Alphas will see it that way too.

“Are you willing to hear me out?” I ask.

“Just get on with it.” Varian’s fraying patience comes through in his tone.

“Alright, let’s talk.”

I take a steadying breath. This is for the best, I remind myself.

The Alphas are under, in a dream-like trance as indicated by their completely blackened eyes. Not a single speck of white to be seen, just pure inky blackness like an endless void I could fall into if I looked long enough.

That’s exactly what I do, I jump into the void and follow it down into their minds — into their memories.

I erase all traces of their knowledge that they’re Mags’ mates and that they love her. I modify their memory of the cave where Mags was stabbed, changing it so that they incorrectly remember that Mags found her father in that cave and went home with Incandis never to return to Shadowmoon.

Gone is their visit to the grove, their memories of making love to her, marking her, claiming her. Memories of her mark on them have been modified so that they don’t remember that it was Mags who branded them. Gone are the memories of her leaving, their heartbreak, and their fury.

They’ll remember meeting her and having her train with them, but they won’t remember the little touches, the growing desire for her, the intense pull of their bond.

Accalia believes that if they don’t remember that she’s their mate, if we erase all memory of that connection, then the Alphas will be able to heal and lead the pack until Mags does return.

If she returns.

It takes me a while to sort through their memories and erase and modify what I need to. The problem is she’s woven into almost every memory, the most recent memories of her are so entwined with themselves it’s hard to know where her essence stops and theirs begins.

Once I’m satisfied that all emotional traces of Mags are gone, I remove myself from their minds and leave them sleeping where they are on the couch. They won’t wake until tomorrow morning, erasing memories takes a toll on the mind, and they had a lot of memories to remove.

With that taken care of, I head up to Kat’s room as Incandis requested. I didn’t pry, but I am curious why he wants her memories wiped too.

Kat doesn’t answer me when I knock on her door asking if I could come in. I can hear her in there, so I decide to try the handle and am pleased when it turns all the way and the door opens for me.

Kat is laying on her bed facing away from me and, from the sound of things, she’s sobbing softly into her pillow.

“Hey, Kat. You have a minute?”

Her crying slows to a whimper as she attempts to school her emotions now that I’m here.

“Incandis said you’d explain everything,” Kat sniffles through her words.

“Yeah, of course. Let’s talk.”

Like her brothers, Kat succumbs to the void allowing me to dive into her mind and erase any emotional memories connected to Incandis as well as any memories of Mags and her brothers being mates.

Luckily Kat’s memories are a little cleaner than the Alphas’ memories, they’re not as tightly bound together.

It’s not long before I’ve managed to clear her mind of Incandis and Mags and their connection to Kat and her brothers.

The lack of whimpers and hiccuping cries in her sleep is indication that I’ve done my job well. Kat sleeps peacefully in her bed, and when she wakes she’ll be none the wiser that her mate and her brothers’ mate are fighting two separate battles with the same end goal: bring Mags home.

Before I teleport home I take a second to collect my thoughts. Despite our rocky start and fragile cordiality, I didn’t take any pleasure in erasing Mags from the Alphas’ minds because I know that In doing so I’ve hurt her. My only justification is that they were self-destructing, and that would have hurt Mags more.

When our only options are to either betray them or let them die, the former is the lesser of the two unimaginable evils.

***

“It’s done.” I announce to Accalia who sits next to her husband fussing nervously in her seat.

Accalia’s head whips around to face me, relief flooding her eyes and softening the features of her face.

“What’s done?” Runidar asks me.

I look between him and Accalia, unsure of how much I’m supposed to reveal and to whom.

After a tense moment Accalia answers his question. “We had to do something, Runidar. We couldn’t just let the boys slowly kill themselves over Magnolia’s disappearance. They have a pack to run.”

Runidar’s jaw tenses for a moment before his tongue sweeps across his lower lip. “What did you do?”

Runidar is clearly not happy that Accalia made a decision for the Alphas without consulting with him, after all he is their right hand man. Accalia struggles with how to begin to explain what’s been done. I take pity on her and explain it to Runidar myself.

“When the Alphas and Kat wake up tomorrow they won’t remember that they found their mates. They won’t remember their connection to Mags and Incandis. As far as they know, your trackers successfully located her father and uncle in that cave and Incandis teleported them home from there. Everything that transpired after that moment has been erased.”

“Please tell me you’re not serious.” Runidar growls. “How are we supposed to search for Mags, our Luna, when they don’t even know why they care about replaceing her?”

“We’re not.” Raine says with authority. “Twilight Grove is petitioning for war. We will aid them anyway we can, but they will be taking over rescue efforts. It’s the best way to protect the pack and it’s Alphas.”

“And when we replace her, what then? How do we explain why they don’t remember their mate? Do you have any idea what they’ll do when they replace out we tampered with their minds? They’ll see this as treason!” Runidar is shouting by the end.

“You leave that to us. Your job is to make sure they get back to business as usual.” Raine says.

“You want me to keep she-wolves out of their beds too, or do you truly not respect their bond at all?” Runidar spits.

That’s not something I had thought of until now and it’s a valid point. Fuck, things just got a little more complicated.

“That’s enough, Beta Runidar! Our biggest concern is keeping them alive and the pack intact. We’ll deal with the fallout later. But I think everyone will agree that them going on a few dates is preferable to death.”

Runidar scoffs, disgust clearly etched in the snarl on his lip. “All due respect sir, you can be the one to explain that to our Luna when she comes home. And then you can explain to our Alphas that it’s your fault they betrayed the other half of their soul.”

I wish those words could have come out of my mouth. I wish I could have been the one to say them, because he’s absolutely right, but how can I criticize Raine and Accalia when I’m the one who actually took their memories?

The only thing I know for sure is that there will be fire and fury before this is through.